


two sturdy oaks

by crownofplanets



Category: Dead Poets Society (1989)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Declarations Of Love, Fix-It, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:47:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25861573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownofplanets/pseuds/crownofplanets
Summary: Professor Keating was aware of just how special his connection with his students was. He knew they saw him not only as a teacher but also a mentor, and he tried his best to rise up to the task. He knew he was out of his depth, however, when a pair of his best students confessed to him what they felt for each other.This, he was not equipped to handle. He could only keep their secrets and hope.Or, alternatively: Todd and Neil come out to Keating and try to make sense of their feelings for each other
Relationships: Todd Anderson/Neil Perry
Comments: 45
Kudos: 268





	1. out His care

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A prison wall was round us both,  
> Two outcast men were we:  
> The world had thrust us from its heart,  
> And God from **out His care** :  
> And the iron gin that waits for Sin  
> Had caught us in its snare
> 
> \- Oscar Wilde, _The Ballad of Reading Gaol_

Todd had to knock twice before Keating heard him. The first time he’d been too quiet, too scared he’d be disturbing the professor on his free time. For a moment after, he second-guessed his entire plan and resolved to leave having gone unnoticed. But the knowledge that sooner or later the matter would have to be dealt with made him stay and knock again.

“Yes?” Keating’s voice called from inside his small office.

Todd twisted the doorknob with a sweaty hand and poked his head inside the room.

“May I speak with you, Professor Keating?” Todd asked weakly.

“Of course, Mr Anderson. Come in, come in.” Keating waved a hand invitingly. 

As Todd slipped into the room, the man searched through his cluttered desk for something to mark the page of the book he was reading. After a second, he settled on a coffee-stained paper napkin that he carelessly stuck between the pages. Keating was a strange fellow: he would scribble on his books to no avail, but he’d be damned if he ever dog-eared a single page.

“Come right on in and sit down.” He signalled to a chair where a pile of graded exams sat and indicated with a dismissive gesture to put the papers on the floor. “Don’t mind the clutter, Mr Anderson. Lord knows _I_ don’t.”

That much was evident. Exam season was not kind on Professor Keating’s office, for every surface available was brimming with papers. His desk, the shelves of his bookcase, all the chairs save for the one he was sitting on were crawling with assignments, quizzes and essays. The sheets stirred with the breeze blown in through the open window; they breathed.

“What can I do you for, Todd?” Keating asked once the boy had settled on the chair before him.

Todd looked at the ground, unable to meet the man’s eye. Keating was barefoot, he noticed, and wearing deep burgundy socks.

“I…” He began, but could not get another sound out.

Where was he supposed to start? How? Why was he so sure Keating was the one to come to?

“Are you having trouble with the readings I assigned?” The professor asked tentatively.

Todd shook his head rather violently. “N-no, that’s not…”

After a pause where it became evident that the boy would not speak another word, the professor tried again.

“Is it your other subjects? Chemistry? Latin?”

Todd shook his head no. He fidgeted, nipping at his thumb with neatly-clipped nails, before raising his eyes to meet Keating’s.

“If you’re gonna make me guess, I should warn you that I’m _spectacularly_ bad at puzzles,” Keating said, hoping to coax a smile from Todd.

The poor boy looked on the verge of sickness.

The instinct to run pinched at the back of Todd’s neck; that ever-present urge to retreat, the feeling of wanting nothing more than to escape uncomfortable or difficult circumstance. The pinching turned to scratch, and Todd had almost resolved to go back on his words and admit that it was nothing when Keating spoke again.

“Is someone giving you a hard time, Todd?”

Todd’s situation was so particular and odd that he knew this was the closest his professor would get to guessing what actually ailed him.

“Yes," he said, careful to inject just the right amount of doubt into the word, "b-but not in that way that you think.”

Keating appraised his spasmodic answer, mulled it over, and replied, “In what way, then?”

This was the hard part. How could Todd possibly tell? Doing so, seeking comfort or advice, would mean acknowledging what he was going through was alright, that it wasn’t wrong; that it wasn’t a sin.

“I…” Todd began, “You’re never at Sunday mass.”

The sudden change in topic took Keating aback. The man leaned back on his chair and appraised Todd, a hand scratching at the day-old stubble on his chin.

To the boy, it wasn’t a change in topic, though it may have seemed that way. Not _really_.

The professor didn’t ask what the statement had to do with anything but gave him, instead, a candid reply, “I’m not much of a catholic, I’m afraid."

“You’re not?” Todd sounded almost relieved. Of all things, the fact that Keating was not religious was amongst the better options he’d considered. And he’d considered all of them. “So you don’t believe in hell?”

This, too, Keating contemplated. It was the first time in all his life, Todd noted, that an adult paid such careful attention to the words that came out of his mouth.

“I’m not sure,” the man finally replied. “I find that my moral compass isn’t too pleased with the idea of bad people going unpunished, but I have to trust that our legal system will determine punishment enough for those who deserve it. Why are you asking?” 

Todd shrugged, fearful again. The legal system. What Todd was, whatever that may be, wasn't only a sin. He had as much reason to fear hell as he did the law.

He shouldn’t have come. What had he been _thinking_?

“Todd, are you worried about hell?” The professor asked, leaning forward again.

Todd frowned. Averted his eyes. Shrunk in his seat. 

“I think so,” he whispered. His words were but threads of sound. 

He didn’t _think_ so; he _was_. Deadly worried, almost too worried to breathe. But somehow admitting that to professor Keating seemed foolish—childish, even. Todd had been raised a God-fearing child, and it was _because_ these values had been instilled in him from such a young age that he felt so vulnerable revealing them.

“Who’s bothering you, kiddo?” 

It was equal parts strange and comforting to have his professor call him that. He never had before, which accounted for the strange part, yet there was a fatherly nature to the way he said it, which accounted for the comforting one.

Without taking a breath that would allow him to overthink what he was about to do, Todd said, “Neil.”

“Neil?” Keating frowned, a certain tinge of protest to the question, “But I thought—”

“Not in the way that you _think_ ,” Todd repeated with emphasis. He couldn’t bring himself to explain.

Keating sat on his words, mulled them over. His frown grew deeper and deeper until Todd thought he’d get a headache from thinking so much.

And then, suddenly, the frown was gone; replaced by a look that pulled the muscles of Keating’s face in directions Todd had never seen them being pulled before. There was compassion and concern and wariness and a touch of ease. Try as he might, Todd could not see in his professor’s expression the signs of disgust and anger that he was so adamantly searching for.

Todd only realised his leg was shaking when Keating put his hand on his knee.

“It’s alright,” he said carefully. “Look at me, Todd.” The boy raised his eyes to meet the decided gaze of his mentor, “It’s alright.”

Todd had a hard time believing that. He’d spent his entire life being taught how much of an atrocity his feelings were, how they would land him a prime place in hell. It was a hard thing to let go of, even harder to unlearn. 

“It certainly won’t make life easy for you,” Keating said, as though he was speaking to himself. “But that doesn’t make your feelings any less true.”

“Y-you think so?” Todd finally brought himself to ask. 

“Yeah, kid! Uncle Willy himself will tell you: ‘love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.’”

“I don’t think that’s what he meant,” Todd spoke, discouraged. 

“Who are we to say?” Keating shrugged with a smile. “Meager beings compared to him, we are.”

It made Todd smile, despite himself; despite everything.

“I take it you’ve had this weighing on you for a while, then,” Keating continued.

Todd breathed, and when he breathed he found his chest open and his shoulders light. He straightened his posture a little and nodded.

“I didn’t think… I thought anyone I told would get me expelled,” he confessed.

“Well, I wouldn’t risk telling very many people, Todd. Especially that Cameron bugger, always gave me a bad feeling.” He shivered theatrically, “You must feel safe around whoever you tell, which only makes me very flattered that you decided to tell _me_.”

Todd blushed. He had certainly not foreseen this turn of events, and could hardly believe the words he was hearing.

“Why don’t you tell me about Neil, then?” Keating asked with a sly, knowing smile.

Todd looked at him confused, “You already know all about him.”

“Not through your eyes, I don’t,” he smiled brightly.


	2. two sturdy oaks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Two sturdy oaks** I mean, which side by side,  
> Withstand the winter’s storm,  
> And spite of wind and tide,  
> Grow up the meadow’s pride,  
> For both are strong.
> 
> Above they barely touch, but undermined  
> Down to their deepest source,  
> Admiring you shall find  
> Their roots are intertwined  
> Insep’rably.
> 
> \- Henry David Thoreau, _Friendship_

There was a tingle in Neil’s legs as he stalked toward his English professor. He half-walked, half-ran across the courtyard until he reached Keating’s bundled up figure, followed the white cloud of breath that rose from his scarfed-up mouth.

“Professor!” Neil exclaimed before he reached him.

Keating turned around but kept walking backwards, towards the lake. The man's eyes crinkling at the sides were the only indication that he was smiling at him.

“Neil,” he said pleasantly when the boy reached him. “Taking a stroll, are we?” He eyed him up and down.

Neil was terribly underdressed for the weather: the cold winter air seeped through his blazer; it bit at the skin of his abdomen where the tail of his shirt had been untucked. The chill breeze had made his face red, and his nose run.

“No, yeah, I—” He haphazardly tucked the shirt back into his trousers, “I saw you through the window. Ran straight down.”

“Something the matter?” Keating asked.

“No, not really, I just… wondered if I could join you for a walk.”

Seeing only the top half of his face, Neil thought his professor was skeptical of his fib at least, and a little amused, though it was hard to tell without watching the gestures of his mouth.

“Aren’t you cold, Mr Perry?” Amused. Definitely amused.

“Ah, not really. I’m very warm-blooded.”

Keating raised an eyebrow, “So you are.”

The professor turned back around and allowed Neil to walk beside him.

It was too early in the season to snow, yet the chill was not merciful because of it. The sky was grey and packed, thick clouds extending to the horizon. And the wind, though not as unrelenting as it had been by the end of fall, still made Neil wish he had not rushed out of his room so unclad as he had.

They walked in silence for a few moments, but Mr Keating was not one much devoted to quietness, especially not in the presence of the most brilliant of his students.

“Was there anything in particular that you wanted to discuss?” He asked Neil.

The boy stuttered in his step, unprepared for the suddenness with which he would have to speak his concerns.

“Yes,” Neil said quickly, like ripping a band-aid. “Thoreau.”

“Thoreau?” There was surprise subdued by knowledge of character: of course Neil Perry would run from the warmth of Wellton’s halls, wearing only light layers, to discuss poetry on a cold winter’s day.

Neil shoved his hands into the pockets of his trousers to keep them from freezing and hunched against the bite of the wind. He made a sound of agreement.

“Your essay on him was quite alright if I remember correctly,” Keating said, “Are you looking to get extra credit?”

“No, not really,” the boy said, “I’ve been… reading some of his other poems. You know, apart from the ones you assigned, sir.”

“Have you, now?” He sounded pleased. The corners of his eyes crinkled again.

“Yes,” Neil confessed sheepishly.

They were approaching the tree line, beyond which lay the lake. Neil wondered if it was frozen over already, and thought that if it hadn’t, and this conversation went downhill quicker than he wished it, the freezing waters would provide a much finer alternative to ever having to face Keating again.

The professor waited for him to continue.

“I came across ‘Friendship’,” the boy spoke, finally.

Keating made a sound of assent, “Five-line stanzas, rhymed _abaac_.”

Neil said nothing.

“I’m guessing it’s not the rhyme and meter you wanted to review,” the professor said, matter-of-factly.

A nervous sort of chuckle escaped Neil, “No, sir.”

The similarities did not escape professor Keating’s cunning eyes. He eyed Neil, took in his fidgeting and the averting eyes and knew he had seen something akin to it a few months back.

“Here.” Keating stopped his unhurried stroll and unfurled the scarf around his neck. He extended it toward his student.

“Oh, I’m alright, thank—.”

“Take it.”

With reluctance, Neil took the wool scarf and wrapped it around his throat. He smiled and thanked him.

“Wouldn’t want one of my brightest to freeze to death,” Keating said simply.

Neil blushed at the compliment and resumed their walk, wishing to appear less smug than he felt.

“So. ‘Friendship’, huh?” Keating asked. “Powerful stuff from our friend Henry David.”

Neil laughed, albeit a little dryly. “Yeah, I know.”

As they reached the trees, the ground squelched under their feet. Neil stared at the soggy mixture of leaves, branches and wet soil, saw that he carried it on the soles of his shoes and was grateful that he had caught Keating when he had. There did not seem to be a place more suitable for such a conversation: Wellton’s hallways, though warm, were uncomfortable in their echo; and the Indian Cave seemed much too personal for either of them. Their experiences within the Society linked and divided them at the same time. Keating was a mentor, not a peer. That difference was what made the bare trees around them so appropriate.

Neil began, “From what I understand, Thoreau says the truth of neither love nor friendship can ever be truly spoken. Love is too overwhelming to be put into words, and friendship is like the intertwined roots of two oaks: hidden underground, unseen.”

“Indeed,” Keating said, linking his hands behind his back as they walked.

“So, my question is, how does one differentiate the two?” Neil asked, short and clipped, refraining from letting too much emotion spill into his words.

They were at the waterside then, looking out into the lake’s murky, still waters. It hadn’t frozen over yet, so Neil might still get a chance to dive in if Keating read too deep into his words and discovered his secret.

“Are you asking how one can tell fraternal love apart from romantic love?”

Neil shrugged, “I suppose.” He wrapped his blazer around his chest, heart suddenly beating faster. “I would guess romantic love isn’t unlike the intertwined roots he speaks of, you know. And so, how can one know? When does a friendship give way to more?”

Neil clenched his jaw. He could feel himself speaking out of line, revealing too much. The only friends Keating knew of were the poets, all of them men. He'd have to trust the man's ignorance on matters like these, and hope he would assume his friend a lady. Neil wasn't all-too pleased with those odds.

And if his words did not give him away, surely the galloping beating of his heart would.

The professor crouched by the edge of the water, like he usually did when he had some secret wisdom to share. Neil followed him to the ground and fiddled with a dandelion that had somehow survived the cold.

“Tell me, Mr Perry,” Keating spoke evenly, “Is there someone in particular who’s sparked this interest?”

Neil froze. This time, the chill in the air had nothing to do with it. He breathed in a shallow breath, to steady his heart. He pulled the dandelion from its roots.

“No,” Neil lied, for the question sounded too close to an accusation; too much like he would be reprimanded for any answer other than the one he gave. “Just general curiosity.”

“Hm,” Keating hummed, and after a pause where he considered Neil’s question, he said, “Well, I suppose it’s got to do with a gut feeling. There’s only few things in life that aren't dependent on a good gut feeling—economics and all that. But _love_ ,” he injected feeling into the word, _sighed_ it. “Oh, love is entirely a gut feeling. It’s the pull of the heartstrings and the unwinding of the intestines, Neil.” He chuckled. “It’s the heaving of the stomach, like a big rollercoaster drop. You ever gone on one? Felt your bowels rise into your ribcage?”

He had. Once, on holiday years before, when his family still did that sort of thing.

And later, every single time he looked at Todd since the time he…

He took his professor’s question as a rhetorical one. Answering it would mean giving too much away.

Neil wasn’t Knox. His romantic endeavours would not bring on the support of every member of the Society; they would not stand in solidarity next to the phone as he pursued the person he loved. They would shun him, if not sell him out to Nolan, and things would never be the same.

“Neil,” Keating said.

When the boy rose his eyes from the water and looked to his professor, he found he was already staring at him; had been, probably, for a while.

“Are you in love with someone?”

The question was spoken softly, lacking anything resembling anger, disgust or resentment; so much so that Neil thought Keating had only guessed half the truth of the matter. Yes, he was in love with someone, and the professor was clearly aware of it, but that someone was no woman.

Neil could feel his limbs tremble. It was not an unfamiliar sensation. After all, he was his father’s son, and had grown up under his care: the crawling fear, the anxiety, they were as common as turkey on thanksgiving.

But it was Keating next to him. A man so different from his father that conjuring up the image of them side by side was nearly impossible. They existed separately; occupied different spaces in Neil’s heart.

The trembling subsided, though his heart rate did not.

“I think I am,” Neil told him, barely a whisper.

Somewhere not too far, the creek gurgled as it bled into the lake. It was the only sound that filled the empty space for a moment.

Keating threw an arm around Neil’s shoulders. The warmth of his body against the boy’s poorly-dressed frame was comforting. Another image of his father flashed into Neil’s mind: still as a statute, his father stood on the porch of their house, snow dusting the top of his winter coat. He looked sternly down at 14-year-old Neil and walked inside, locking the door behind him.

“I am going to say something now, Mr Perry, and I don’t want you freaking out and running off on me, okay?” Keating said.

Neil’s lips quivered as he breathed in, “No promises.”

The professor chuckled, and the vibration of it reached the far corners of Neil’s chest.

“I think I know who you’re in love with.”


	3. love and a cough

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As it has been said:  
>  **Love and a cough**  
>  cannot be concealed.  
> Even a small cough.  
> Even a small love.
> 
> -Anne Sexton

There was a grin the size of the moon on Neil’s face as he walked into the room. He closed the door gently behind him and leaped into his bed, muddy shoes unremoved.

“Neil,” Todd groaned from his desk at the trail of muck his roommate had left on the floor. 

“Todd,” Neil mimicked his tone of reproach. The grin remained firmly in place.

There was a scarf around his neck that had not been there an hour ago when he’d dashed out the room like a maniac on a mission.

“Whose scarf is that?”

Neil looked from the ceiling down to his chest, where the tail of the wool scarf rested, bright against his dark uniform.

“Oh. Keating gave it to me.” He kicked his shoes off and put his hands under his head.

Todd’s breath caught in his throat. “You talked to Keating?” It came out a little strangled, but Neil barely seemed to notice it in his elation.

“Yeah.”

“Oh.”

Neil propped himself up with his elbows and looked at Todd for the first time. The smile dimmed, pulled at the corners by the frown between his eyebrows.

“Are you okay?” Neil wondered, glee replaced by worry.

Todd forced on a convincing smile, “Yeah,” he said, as though he didn’t understand why the question had even been asked.

Suspicion tinted the return of Neil’s grin, but once it had reached the size it had been before, the suspicion gave way to unbridled delight.

“What did you two talk about that’s made you so chipper?”

Before dashing out the room, Neil had been sulking like only a boy in the formative years of his youth could. Todd was not a stranger to his roommate’s moods: it was Keating who had pulled him out of it.

Neil shrugged in response to his question, “Just… poetry.”

Todd rolled his eyes in half-hearted annoyance, but his heart ached.

He had grown to resent that feeling—the twist of his gut whenever jealousy struck. It came from the knowledge that he would never be to Neil what he was to him. Neil was beloved and revered wherever he went; inspired in others feelings Todd could only understand because he had felt them, too. 

In comparison, Todd was plain and little, and whatever feeling he might inspire in Neil would be equal to their fellow poets. Neil had enough heart to care for all of them the same. And the fool was too blind to realise Todd’s heart had only space enough for _him_.

Todd returned to his homework and left Neil to his dazed self. If whatever he was thinking about was deemed worth being discussed, he’d shoot an offhand question his way. If it wasn’t, Todd was almost certain he’d be better off not knowing. Being privy to Neil’s innermost thoughts was what had gotten him in this mess in the first place: if Neil had not been so keen on late-night philosophical debates, or on sharing with him pieces of poetry in quiet winter afternoons, Todd would not have fallen so hard as he had. Of that, he was certain.

To get his mind off the boy on the opposite end of the room, Todd focused on the paper before him, and soon, annotations began taking the form of a fully-fledged essay. 

Before he had even finished his first draft, Todd found himself squinting against the darkness of the room. He blinked once, twice, and realised that outside their window, the sun had gone.

He straightened his hunched-over posture and stretched his arms over his head. A few joints popped back into place. He groaned.

Without turning the desk lamp on, Todd turned around to find Neil.

The boy had propped himself up against the wall, a forgotten book on his lap. His features, washed over with the blue tones of an early winter dusk, were frozen into a serene expression. He was lost in his thoughts. His eyes, unwavering, were fixed on Todd.

“You okay?” Todd asked.

Neil blinked and shook himself out of his daze.

“Huh?”

Todd smiled, “How long have you been like that?”

Neil threw the book aside and flopped down on the mattress, yawning. “Dunno.”

Todd watched as his roommate stretched like a cat. When Neil spread his arms toward the foot of the bed, his blazer rode up and the tail of his shirt became untucked, exposing a thin strip of bare skin along his lower back.

Todd looked away.

“What time is it?” Neil asked through a second yawn.

Todd turned on his desk lamp and looked at the clock beside it. “Almost six.”

“D’you wanna skip dinner?” Neil asked suddenly.

“What?”

The boy sat up on the edge of his bed and leaned forward. The grin was back. “Let’s skip dinner.”

“Can we… do that?” Todd asked, already shrinking into his chair.

Neil got to his feet in an instant, shrugged off his blazer, unbuttoned his shirt, and donned on a turtleneck instead. He dug through his drawers for one of his knit sweaters and did not pause to acknowledge the look of disbelief in Todd’s face.

“Neil.”

“Huh?” Neil hummed, halfway into the sweater.

“Will you slow down for two seconds?” 

“N-no?” He laughed as he struggled against the garment. He mumbled something under his breath, shuffling in place, tugging at the sweater this way and that. “Shit.”

He stopped squirming with his arms raised over his head.

“I’m stuck,” he said, defeated.

Todd laughed, “Do you need help?”

“Yes, please.”

Todd grabbed Neil by the sides and turned him around. Then, he began tugging at the knit with incompetent hands.

“Wait—”

“No—”

“Stop moving—!”

“Here—”

“For God’s sake, Anderson—!”

“There!”

With one final wrench of the collar, Neil’s head was freed. His face was flushed from the effort and his breath a little ragged. He pulled the sweater down over his torso and looked at Todd in the eye.

Caught by surprise by the effortlessness of Neil Perry’s beauty, with his tousled hair and his pink ears, Todd could not help the look of infatuation that overtook his features. It was an innate reaction, something so out of his control that Todd could not even be embarrassed by it.

So far from Neil’s mind was the idea that Todd might love him back that the meaning behind his expression went right over his head. Because Keating, good old professor Keating, had guessed it was Todd that he loved, but had kept to himself the conversation in his office from months back. It was not his place to reveal Todd’s secret. Moreover, Keating was rather fond of the spectacle; it all seemed quite Shakespearian to him. 

It was Neil’s soft frown what clued Todd up to the state of his own face.

He took a step back and cleared his throat.

“So… are you changing into something warmer or…?” Neil asked.

“Yeah.”

Todd turned around, threw his blazer on the bed and unbuttoned the thin, white shirt. Goosebumps crawled all over his arms as the winter chill grazed his skin. He hurried as he looked through the drawers, heat rising up his neck as the seconds passed and his back remained exposed to Neil.

Todd did not like being stared at; much less while half-naked. The mere thought of someone glancing at him was enough to make him blush, and the thought of it being _Neil_ potentially looking his way set his nerves aflame.

Neil, on his end, felt all too close to death.

There was a marked difference between the showers and this. On the regular, he saw about fifty boys naked all at once. He didn’t mind it. It wasn’t like he was actively looking, either. It wasn’t in his interest to comment on the other boy’s bodies, like it was for Charlie and Richard.

Todd was an altogether different story.

It wasn’t until Neil began seeing Todd—really seeing him, to the deepest crevices of who he was—that his body began reacting to him. Not until Neil had glimpsed at the boy he was beyond the classroom and the cave and the dining hall, that he felt the need to start avoiding him in the showers.

Todd, though unaware of the reason behind it, had always been relieved at his distance: from the moment he’d laid eyes on him, even before knowing him, Todd knew no one could compare to Neil Perry.

And now, though this image was not at all unusual, Neil could not tear his eyes away from Todd’s broad back. Though they had seen each other bearer, the validation of his feelings that Neil had received from Keating that afternoon filled his body with renewed conviction.

It was quite a task to keep his hands from those shoulders. He’d seen them straighten over the months, as Todd gained confidence in himself. They had been low and tense when he’d first met him; carrying the weight of his world. But as the seasons came and went, and the things that happened, happened, his shoulders uncoiled, the pressure gave, and Todd became thus the most wonderful thing Neil had ever laid eyes on.

In a moment stretched out in time, Neil felt the warmth of his feelings pool at the bottom of his stomach.

Todd pulled shirt and jumper over his head and turned back around with a light dusting of pink across his cheeks.

“Are you sure about this?” He asked.

Neil grinned, “Abso-fucking-lutely.”


	4. no notion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have **no notion** of loving people by halves; it is not my nature.
> 
> \- Jane Austen, _Northanger Abbey_

They scurried through stone-cold halls and up creaky stairs, hiding in the broad shadows of pillars and around corners. Dinner was called about halfway through their expedition, but it only caused the slight hesitation of Todd’s feet, quickly remedied by the sight of Neil’s hand extended toward him.

Todd took it before Neil could get a chance to regret it. He held it loosely, at first, hesitant; to give him the chance to pull away if he wanted to. But Neil, fueled by the warm pressure of Todd’s palm, laced their fingers together and held on tightly as he pulled him along.

The gesture made Todd’s heart climb up his throat and choke his words into nonexistence. He could breathe only a little, through the nose, and made no effort to speak—he knew that whatever word he’d manage would come out paper-thin and absurd.

Led by Neil, Todd stumbled through dark, abandoned corridors. Curiosity burned alongside everything else, aching to inquire after their destination. He had always trusted Neil enough not to get him into trouble, though watching him now—the glow about him, the shine—he was less certain he’d be half so cautious as he usually was. He seemed determined, even more so than usual, and that determination both excited and scared him. But God be damned if it wasn’t a beautiful sight.

Neil took him into the south end of the building, so removed from the dormitories that Todd had never ventured this far. As the unfamiliar turns became unfamiliar climbs, and they wandered further up the structure, Todd thought he’d figured it out: the clock tower. He was taking him to the clock tower.

The surprise of the realization undid the knot in Todd’s throat.

“Are we allowed to be here?” He whispered though the only ears that could hear them were otherwise occupied with dinner.

“Probably not,” Neil said. “But Meeks and Pitts come up all the time to listen to the radio.”

Todd meant to make a sound of assent, but only a strangled hum came out.

Neil chuckled ahead of him.

“It'll be fine,” Neil assured as they paused on the steps leading up to the roof. He squeezed his hand in the dark, and Todd became too aware of the touch, and consequently too worried about the state of the hand Neil was squeezing so nonchalantly: it was damp with cold sweat, motionless only because Neil was holding it. His other hand trembled enough for the two, however.

At the very top of the stairs, there was a door. Todd prayed that it might be locked so that there was no danger of being caught where they shouldn’t be. It was one thing to be wandering about Welton when they were meant to be at dinner, and another altogether to be _here_ , a place so implicitly forbidden that Todd had never even thought one could come half this far up.

Neil pushed at the door with his free hand. It groaned in protest, but gave in to his shove and opened.

The gust of freezing wind was so shocking that Todd actually gasped.

Neil smiled at him. The moonlight, all but liquid, spilled into the dark landing at the top of the stairs and shone a halo around the outline of Neil's body. The angel was still holding Todd’s hand.

Neil pulled him out onto the roof, disregarding the look of subdued panic on Todd’s face. He knew it was more or less perpetual—or had been, at the beginning of the school year. There was no greater joy in the world to Neil than being the reason why that expression gave way to a smile. 

Neil had always been the type of person to feed off other people’s energy. But around Todd, every single effort was spent giving that energy back; redirecting it, repurposing it to work in Todd’s favour. He thrived more off making Todd smile once than he ever would being the center of attention in a crowd.

No one had ever held such power over Neil. It was scary and disarming, but he was ready to submit to it wholly; heart, soul, and everything in between.

Neil pulled Todd to the edge the roof and watched as the pale light of the moon brushed away the shadows on his face.

If the smile on Neil’s lips would not erase the frown from the space between Todd’s eyebrows, maybe the view would.

They faced the lake and the surrounding bare forest, eerily still in the night.

“Would you look at that,” Neil said, quite amazed himself. He’d been up there but once, the year before, on a senior boy’s invitation, but he had witnessed it all in the daylight.

Neil could not argue against a clear, moonlit night.

“Whoa,” Todd spoke, allowing the sort of emotion into his voice that only a privileged few could witness.

They admired the motionless landscape for a moment, rejoicing in the utter silence of it all. Living where they studied, there was hardly a moments peace. Even their room, where one would guess privacy to be a guarantee, had become the headquarters for all Society matters, usually packed with no less than three poets at a time. And when they did get a moment alone, there was always some work, studying or _thing_ to do instead. Even without them, one could not easily forget the thinness of the walls. Hardly a sound was made by one that could go unheard by the rest.

So it was fair to presume that the forgetfulness of their joint hands had the quiet to thank for its endurance.

Not even the cold, finding its way through the layers of wool and cotton, could take them away from the instant, the second.

But the moment was too good to last.

Guilt, suddenly, washed over Todd. He unclenched his jaw and untangled his fingers from Neil’s. He dropped the boy’s hand—which fell, limp and cold at his side—and brought both hands up to his mouth to blow warm breaths into them. It was all pretend, really; he wasn’t cold in the least—couldn’t be, having Neil so close. But he couldn’t keep hold of his hand under the guise of friendship. Shame ate away at the walls of his stomach.

“You cold?” Neil asked, shoving the hand Todd had let go of into his pocket, to save himself the embarrassment of reaching out again.

“A little,” Todd lied, because anything else would be too suspicious.

Neil, perhaps kidding, perhaps sincerely, began to shrug off his jacket.

Todd, flustered, couldn’t but stop him. “Don’t be dumb,” he said and grabbed at the lapels of his jacket, folding them over his chest once more.

Neil smirked, smug, and let himself be safely bundled up.

“This is nice, isn’t it?” He said when they had turned back toward the school grounds.

The moon glimmered over the surface of the lake, white against the blue-grey shadows.

“Yeah,” Todd replied, “It’s really quiet.”

“Do you want to sit down?”

Todd’s panic returned just as quickly as it had gone, “On the edge?” 

“I won’t let you fall,” Neil smiled, “Promise.”

Along the roof’s perimeter, there was a solid rock rim, cold to the touch. It came to about their knees, certainly not meant as a security measure, merely to keep sensible people from venturing too far out. 

They sat together there, feet planted firmly on the floor. Neil wouldn’t have minded throwing his legs over the edge and dangling them over the gardens below, but he knew his roommate wouldn’t like it.

Todd’s knuckles turned white as he gripped the stone, his eyes fixed on his untied shoelace.

“Distract me,” he asked Neil, clipped.

“What?”

“Distract me. I don’t like being so high up.”

“We can leave if you want to,” Neil said calmly, “I just wanted to show you this.”

He moved his hand from where it had come to rest next to Todd’s and revealed what had been hiding underneath: an inscription, etched into the rock.

“Keating told me about it today,” Neil continued. “He said one of his fellow Society members carved it when they left Welton.”

“What does it say?” Todd craned his neck to try and make out the words, but the light was scarce. Instead, he ran a finger along the inscription, as though he could read it by touch alone.

“ _Vivere memento_.”

Todd smiled, almost letting out a chuckle. “Of course. Remember to live.”

Neil watched on as his friend admired the etching, fingers motionless over it. He stared at it for a long moment, until the smile on his lips began to falter, and his eyebrows to sink into a frown. His lower lip quivered, unperceivable were it not for his biting down on it so hard a second later.

“Todd?”

Tears filled the boy’s eyes when he looked up at Neil.

“Wha—? Why…?”

“Do you understand what this means?” Todd quavered. 

“Of course I do, why are you…?” He ached to reach out, to place a palm to the side of his face and ask more earnestly than he was able.

“Tell me you won’t forget.” The words were barely audible, even in the silent night. “Tell me you’ll remember.”

And so it dawned on Neil: Todd was asking him to follow the instructions etched into the stone. Asking him to live.

Asking him not to die.

It was Todd the one brave enough to touch. He closed his eyes, let the pooling tears spill onto his cheek, and reached for Neil’s shoulder. He pulled him, almost violent, nearly-starved, into his chest; wrapped his arms around him and embraced him tightly, so that he might never leave.

Memories flashed of times gone by, of restless nights and vacant days. There had been no solace but the written word, no saving grace but Todd Anderson and his unwitting magic.

A confession was spoken into Neil’s shoulder, “I don’t know what to do without you.”

 _Oh_. There was that sharp pain again, along the length of Neil's torso. Aching, scorching longing. Was it friendship or love? Could camaraderie be so easily mistaken? How had the men before him been able to tell?

He clung to Todd’s shoulders, finding comfort in their solidness. He let the boy cry into the crook of his neck, unable to comprehend what deed he had done, in this life or another, to deserve him. Surely there was nothing so magnanimous that could justify Todd’s waltzing into his life, carving out a space in his heart and making himself a home there.

To think that he could have lost this, if the darkness had had its way. To think he could have gone away forever, thinking he knew it all—knew that things would never get better—and been one step away from the greatest thing he had ever known.

“I—I’m sorry,” Todd stuttered, pulling away from the embrace. The back of his hand, wrapped in the sleeve of his sweater, swiped at his damp, blotchy cheeks.

“Don’t,” Neil told him. His right hand began reaching for Todd of its own volition, but he pulled it back before contact could be made. He saw Todd’s eyes flicker and catch the gesture, then look decidedly away. “I…”

Without so much as a warning knock, the door to the stairs flew open.

Their bodies, like magnets of equal poles, repelled each other at an unmatched speed. The sudden separation allowed the freezing cold to seep back into their bones.

A figure stood at the door, panting.

“Professor?” Neil asked, bewildered. 

Whatever moment they had, whatever silence, was over now.

“They’re looking for you,” Keating managed in between ragged breaths. He had run all the way there. “I tried to cover for you—said that you’d taken Neil to the nurse, but I don’t know how much they bought it.”

Todd sat still, looking at his English professor like he’d grown an extra head.

“You need to leave. Now!”

Neil regained his sense first, brought Todd to his feet by taking hold of his wrist and pulling.

The three of them reentered the building, the boys ahead of the man. They trotted down the steps in hurried procession, linked by hands on wrists and shoulders. Neil’s fingers wrapped around Todd’s wrist, and Keating’s hands squeezed at his students’ shoulders. The gesture was a silent, conspiratorial signal: _o_ _ne step closer_ , it said. Neil smiled in the dark and glanced at Todd’s shadow beside him; Todd, unaware of the look, bit down on his lip and cradled the happiness inside his chest.

Three pairs of feet reached the bottom of the swirling staircase, one set of lungs panting harder than the other two.

Neil turned to head in the direction of the infirmary—a place he’d visited but once in his four years at Welton—, but Keating stopped him before he could take a step.

“No. Go to your room. I’ve told Mrs Hawking to tell whoever comes looking that she sent you back to the dorms. Hopefully, it’ll buy you some time.”

Todd looked at his professor in disbelief. Why was he doing this?

Neil, instead, only grinned.


	5. root of the root

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here is the deepest secret nobody knows  
> (here is the **root of the root** and the bud of the bud  
> and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows  
> higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)  
> and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
> 
> i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)
> 
> \- E. E. Cummings

When Hager came into the room, he found two boys immersed in the most important performance of their careers thus far: Todd, who was an abhorrent actor, was sitting on the edge of Neil’s bed, his back to the door to keep newcomers from seeing his face; Neil, who was the opposite, delivered the most faithful portrayal of illness to ever grace Hellton’s halls.

“Mr Hager,” moaned Neil, eyes drooping. 

The man remained at the threshold, not daring entrance into the room. “Mr Perry. Are you well?” He asked tightly.

Neil nodded and closed his eyes all the way, “I was about to send Todd for some water. Could you bring some instead, sir?”

Hager, a man disgusted by unwellness, gave him a curt nod and dashed off.

As soon as he disappeared, a smile grew wide on Neil’s lips, and one just as large was mimicked by Todd. Neil sighed theatrically and chuckled, his hand snaking under the covers as it reached for Todd’s. When he clasped it, Neil saw doubt flicker across his friend’s face but was elated to see it gone a second later, as Todd accepted the gesture.

“I wanted to—,” Neil began but was interrupted.

“Here you are, Mr Perry,” announced Hager upon his return.

Todd took the glass of water from him, for the man would simply not step inside. The boy kept his eyes downcast, to hide the outright lie painted all over them. A drop of sweat still clung to his temple from running all the way back to the room.

When Hager was gone again, and the door had been closed behind him, laughter erupted inside the room. Todd and Neil shared in the moment of unbridled elation, their chuckles overlapping in a cacophony of sound.

“I wonder how he ever manages Spaz’s illnesses,” Neil said, throwing the covers aside, still very much clothed underneath them.

Todd sat down, weighed down by the relief of getting away with a lie like that. He leaned back until he was lying face-up on the bed and stared up at the ceiling, waiting for the bubbling sensation in his chest to subside.

“I’ll never let you drag me anywhere again,” he told Neil. The adamance in his tone only prodded the boy on the other bed into another fit of giggles.

All around Todd, there wasn’t a thing that did not glow, either by some illusion of the eyes or the great fluttering of his heart. He wasn’t sure whether it was the adventure that had caused it or Neil. Perhaps it had been a result of both, combined. Any rule-breaking had always been a sure way of getting Todd’s heart to beat erratically, but Neil’s being there had only made it worse. The release of tension, the dwindling of adrenaline, had the world around him glimmering.

There were too many feelings and too little a space inside him.

“I’m sorry,” Neil said in a quiet sort of voice, effectively changing the tone of the conversation.

Todd propped himself up on his elbows and frowned, “What do you mean?”

“It’s just… I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Todd felt his cheeks grow warm as the image came again to mind of the display on the roof—such unbridled emotion, such raw feeling. And to think Keating had almost caught them.

“If you mean about me being scared—,”

“That’s not what I mean,” Neil cut him off gently. He rose from his bed and plopped down next to Todd. “I won’t… leave,” he said in earnest, “Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t. I…”

Todd sat up on the bed, to express his undivided attention.

“I just couldn’t. Not now; not after everything. Believe that, if nothing else,” he said.

Todd was amused by the irony of it all.

“Neil, you could tell me that the sun rises in the west and I’d believe it.” Noting his own words bizarre, he added, “Or at least, I’d wish it were true.”

Neil smiled, but it was not the kind of gesture that reached the eyes.

“I don’t know that that’s a good thing,” he said, all candor.

His friend couldn’t but shrug, “Me neither, but it’s the truth.”

Neil’s eyes looked away from Todd, into the same nothingness where they usually drifted when he was mulling something over.

An anxious feeling clutched at Todd’s heart. He feared any further pondering would lead Neil to realise what he’d so long been hiding. He was smart—smarter than Todd could ever hope to be—and would figure it out sooner or later. The boy still held hope it would be the latter rather than the former.

“You know, I don’t think I’ve met someone more honest than you,” Neil spoke then, unprompted.

Todd’s initial reaction was to deny the claim entirely, even if it were a compliment, “That’s a lie,” he said.

Neil sat cross-legged on the bed, “No, it’s not.”

There was a single glaring detail that Todd kept hidden, which rendered him dishonest to the gravest degree, “Yes, it is.”

“You don’t tell me things like other people do,” Neil refuted, “Even my father, who says things no one else would dare, doesn’t speak like you do. Yours are kind truths; even when they shouldn’t be—even when I don’t deserve them.”

“You always deserve kindness,” Todd told him soberly, almost chastising him for ever believing otherwise. “Even when you think you don’t.”

Neil gave him a sad smile—more a press of the lips than anything.

Todd knew how hard these sort of truths were to accept, to acknowledge. He himself had just resisted one much like it from Neil, the one person he’d sworn he’d believe anything from. Some things, he guessed, must always be hard to come to terms with.

“Thank you,” Neil whispered, leaning his head on the heel of his hand, elbows on his legs. He sighed, then, a laugh mixed into the misery. “It’s funny. I always feel that ‘thank you’ can never fully account for all the things I’m grateful for. Two words seem too little.”

Todd was silent for a moment.

When he spoke, it was merely a whisper, “There’s nothing to thank me for.”

If it was gratefulness all that Neil felt for him, let it be just that. He wasn’t sure he could handle anything more.

Neil stared at his friend, upset that he would not accept the extent to which he had helped him.

“You’ll never understand, will you?” He told him, looking into Todd’s eyes without the intention of letting him look away. “Todd, there’s nothing that matters to me more than you.”

There was that single truth: so indispensable to one, so unbelievable to the other.

It hung in the air for a moment, as truths long silenced usually do. Neither of the two dared to pick it off the air and address it, for fear of disturbing the delicate, fragile sentiment behind it. Handling it with hands and lips would ruin whatever semblance of neutrality it had managed so far.

They sat close together, and the words filled the open space between their bodies. Neither of the two moved an inch.

Perhaps it had been too fast, Neil thought; too soon. Perhaps there wasn’t time enough in the entire history of mankind for the boy to love him back. For it was love, he decided. Nothing but love could feel so good and ache so much in the same breath. 

Always a man to think on his feet, Neil gave Todd a smile that stripped the words of any implication: he gave him a way out. Out of having to shut him down, out of reporting him to Mr Nolan; out of having to deal with the complications of being loved by him.

Neil patted Todd’s shoulder to drive the point home, without realising the message he was sending was entirely the wrong one.

The blond saw his chance come and go. He watched as the window of opportunity shrunk until it was too late to say anything. His eyes followed Neil as he stood, and his heart ached when the subject was swiftly changed.

He knew it would never go back to that near-perfect place that once might have seen a profession of love born


	6. composed of nows

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forever is **composed of nows**.
> 
> \- Emily Dickinson

Todd had never felt the power of words so vividly as when Neil first asked how he had slept the following morning.

To all outsiders, the question might have sounded polite; mundane, even. They _were_ roommates, after all. But to Todd, oh to the great overthinker, it mattered a great deal.

The question rang too formal coming from Neil, who never asked such things. It built an invisible barrier, no matter how unintentional. It set a boundary that had never before been in place.

Theirs was a friendship of all hours, unchanged by the hands of the clock. Four a.m thoughts must be shared lest they die for going unspoken, as must secrets during McAllister’s class. A glance or a wink could replace any and all words, and Todd would not have wished it undone for anything in the world.

Even here; even now.

So the question—that infamous “how’d you sleep last night?”—became, just like that, the insult added to the injury.

But it wasn’t in Todd to be resentful of something so unforseen as offence taken by a single party. What he did, instead of blaming him, was immerse himself in the task of hurting on the inside and doing his best not to let it show.

He reverted back to old quietness. Awkwardness crept back into his manner, all long limbs with nowhere to go but the wrong place. His words became again entangled with stutters, and his eyes could hardly bear the burden of looking.

Neil could not forgive himself.

Despite Todd’s efforts to hide that unnamable feeling—disappointment, perhaps, or disillusion—, Neil saw right through him. He knew he couldn’t be half so proud of such an observation when it was him that had caused that change in Todd. Whatever pleasure Neil derived from knowing him so deeply was overshadowed by the fact that it was he who had caused Todd pain.

Neil couldn’t fix the exact moment, but he knew this was all his fault. And that weighed heavier on him than any other burden.

The snow came finally, a week later than Charlie’s betting polls had almost unanimously agreed upon. It fell first in the night, silent as a ghost, and greeted them in the morning as a frozen sludge of rotten leaves and mud. The air was crisp with winter, mean in its bite and sting.

Neil began hearing Todd tremble at night. His teeth clattered together silently, barely audible over the roar of the wind outside and the shaking windowpanes. In the occasional moonlight, he could just make out the curve of Todd’s shoulder in the gloom, shivering.

As days grew colder, Neil’s radiator seat became too hot for comfort, and he was thus relegated to his desk chair. The replacement of one sight—a focused frown, a bottom lip caught between teeth, hands hard at work—for that of a blank wall made Neil despise winter. He wanted it gone; wanted the bloom of spring to return the soft tan to Todd’s features and, with a bit of luck, his smile, too. He wanted (or rather, needed) enough sunlight in the morning as to properly watch Todd wake up. He knew the succession by heart now: the scrunching of the nose, followed by the rubbing of the eyes and the immense yawn; the lazy blinking. Now he could only guess by the sounds he made. The ruffling of the sheets, the long intake of breath.

He missed the sight of him freshly tousled and their silent understanding.

Now there was only a wall.

Professor Keating was of little help. In his effort to keep Todd’s secret, he could give no evidence when assuring Neil he had been right in bearing his heart like he had, even if the results had been less than ideal. He couldn’t, in all good confidence, tell him that Todd did indeed love him back, but he _could_ tell him that the burden of staying silent would have eventually become worse than whatever weighed him down now.

Neil was less inclined to believe him than he was to punish himself for ever having spoken in the first place.

As winter break approached, and their respective returns home became an inevitability, Neil’s vacantness returned. He made it a habit of disappearing for hours on end, too preoccupied with the darkness within to really remember to worry about that which had lately surrounded Todd.

Todd didn’t blame him for it. He was all-too-aware of what going home meant to Neil.

He had spent countless nights listening to him recount his childhood, comforting him as the first rays of sunlight broke through the clouds. He had shaken him awake from more nightmares than he would care to count. He had helped him, in whatever small way he could, when all of it seemed too much to bear.

Todd hated Neil’s father. The feeling burned bright inside of him, second only to the love he felt for the man’s son. And because there was nothing that tied Todd to him, no familial obligation or speck of guilt, he often let his rage roam free inside his head.

It was only on the Friday before winter break that Todd found it in himself to act upon that rage.

Hager had come to call on Neil some fifteen minutes earlier, to tell him that his father was on the phone. Todd had watched as the color drained from his roommate’s features, as his lips pressed into a thin line and he rose from his chair, defeated, and left.

Todd was left to flounder in his uneasiness until Neil returned. 

And when he did, all sunken cheeks and misery, he flopped down on his bed first, spoke second.

“You okay?” Todd asked wearily, inching forward until he was at the edge of his mattress.

Neil’s words were muffled, “I don’t know.”

“What’d he want?”

He turned his head to the side, facing the wall, “To let me know the time he and mom are picking me up.”

Todd got up from the bed, springs squeaking, and sat right back down when Neil turned to look at him.

Embarrassed, Todd stuttered, “A-are you okay?”

“I said I don’t _know_.”

“Sorry.”

“No, don’t—don’t fucking apologize to me,” Neil barked.

Todd blinked in shock. His first instinct was to apologize again, but the surprise wound his throat so tight he couldn’t speak.

Neil sat up. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. Placed his hands at either side of himself.

“It’s just… You apologize like that to men who intimidate you. I hate that that’s me right now,” he said miserably.

“Neil, that’s not…”

“Yes, it is. There’s a lot of things I can’t tell, but I’m pretty sure I know myself well enough to tell when I’m being a dick.”

Todd didn’t know what to say to that, so he said nothing.

Inside him, however, irritation grew. Wasn’t it enough for the father to have the son squished under his thumb? To have him enact his every damn whim? Did he have to take him away, too, from himself? Neil’s sanctuary was any place away from his father, he had told Todd as much. So why was it that the man could reach even here?

Todd hated him.

“Sometimes I wish…” He began, venom-like anger slipping through his teeth. He caught himself before he said something he would regret.

But the tone of his voice had caught Neil’s attention, for it bordered on the kind of feeling he had never seen Todd express before.

“What is it?” He asked.

The ire bubbled inside until it manifested in a pair of flushed cheeks. Todd fixed his eyes on the floor. Looking at Neil and seeing the state of him would only tip him over the edge.

“I wish I could— That I could—!” 

Oh, manners be damned. Todd had spent the whole of his life silencing his every thought. It would do no longer 

“Sometimes I wish I could kill your father, Neil!” He exclaimed. There was no stopping the flood once it had begun, “I want to erase every trace of him from your skin; extirpate every fragment of a thought you ever spared him. I want— I want to take all the evil he ever did to you and choke it until it’s gone. I wish I could undo it all, Neil. I wish I could lift all burden, take all pain. But I don’t know how. I don’t know how, and it kills me. To see _him_ behind your eyes when you look at me, to hear _his_ words from your mouth at night. I want—.” He balled his hands into fists; dug his nails into the tender skin of his palm.

All that was left from the animated speech was a ring in Todd’s ear.

He didn’t look at Neil. Couldn’t. He feared the expression he would find in his face. Surprise and anger mixed in with serious offense, certainly. _He_ could talk of his father how he pleased, and endure all his ill intent, but anyone else’s critical words would be considered a trespass.

Todd was sure he had forever burned the bridge between them. Now there were only two walls on either side of a chasm.

Given the direction of his concerns, then, it was no wonder that his first thought when Neil tackled him onto the bed was that the boy was trying to fight him.

He waited first for the strike of a fist, and when that prediction failed him, and he found his throat quite wound in Neil’s arms, he assumed an attempt at choking was not long ahead.

But then he noted Neil’s face, and the place it had gone: buried, hidden in the crook of his neck. He felt its warmth against his throat and the definite dampness of tears. And the clasp of his arms; it was more embrace than strangle.

Neil’s weight was heavy on Todd’s chest. The boy’s entire body trembled like a leaf, his desperate fingers grabbing at whatever part of Todd they could. His legs clasped around Todd’s hips with no intention of letting go.

Once over the initial jolt of surprise, Todd hugged Neil back. He snuck his hands around his torso and held him tight, knowing no other way to express encouragement.

Without really meaning to, one of Todd’s hands came up to cradle Neil’s head. His fingers combed through his short hair, drawing invisible shapes on his scalp. It was always a comfort to Todd to have his hair brushed; he guessed Neil would shake off his touch if he found it unpleasant.

But he didn’t. Instead, Neil seemed to sink into the caress, to melt into it. His body stopped shaking.

There they remained, for a time neither of the two would dare tally; two sturdy oaks.

For a while, nothing moved. Not the shadows, not the clock. Even the wind outside succumbed to the moment and quieted its flurry. There remained only steadying breaths and the quiet ruffle of fabric.

Before long, as though the small burrow they had carved out in time had begun collapsing around them, Todd felt a fluttering in his chest. 

It was an odd sensation. It was certainly an accelerated heartbeat, so perfectly placed on his chest that it must be his own heart, and yet… it wasn’t. The thumping came not from beneath his ribcage but over it. The warmth didn’t flare from within but from the outside.

It was Neil’s heart that hammered so.

Slowly, just as if he were beguiling a wild fawn, Todd coaxed Neil with soft touches, brought his face out of the shadows where it hid. He held his face between soft palms, rubbed his thumbs across his cheekbones.

Neil’s eyes were red-rimmed, cheeks blotchy. His eyebrows were ruffled at the ends, where they met his frown. Todd smiled and brushed the hairs with a feather-like touch. Neil sighed, and the worried lines across his face were smoothed over one by one.

When Neil had closed his eyes and brought his forehead to touch Todd’s, he became aware of the degree to which he had bared his soul to this boy. He couldn’t have known him better if he were to lie naked before him. And it scared him. Vulnerability scared him, and weakness. 

“Don’t do anything you don’t mean,” Neil begged quietly, as a last resort to protect his heart. “Please.”

He listened as Todd inhaled a long breath, too scared to open his eyes. Begging was of no use, of course. There was no safeguarding something he had already lost.

After a tortuous moment, Todd gave his reply, “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

Closing the small gap between their lips became then only a matter of motion. All Todd had to do was tilt his chin upwards ever-so-slightly.

Neil had always believed that kissing was simply mechanics, a procedure to be perfected with time which involved more sensation than feeling. Despite his beloved poetry claiming otherwise, Neil had no evidence to support the theory of life-altering kisses. The girls he had kissed—for his entire repertoire was female—had all come with varying traits: teeth, tongue, drool, giggles. He had always been too aware of them, careful in his assessment of each one.

It wasn’t until he was kissing Todd Anderson that he realised the glaring error in his belief.

The second his lips touched Todd’s, his mind went entirely blank. There wasn’t a single thought to grab at, no observation on the logistics of it. It was all feeling, all warmth. Instinct overtook him, and he let his body react as he explored the newfound sense of bliss.

It was almost too bright. So overpowering he feared he would never regain autonomy. It was electric, charged. 

Neil was a bolt of stray lightning, and Todd was solid ground.

And the solid ground trembled. It shook with the strength of an earthquake, absorbed all electric discharge.

Todd, who had never kissed anybody (let alone someone he loved), let himself be entirely guided by Neil. To him, it was all scorched earth. His skin burned where Neil grazed it, and the parts of him untouched ached to feel his caress.

Neither of the two could tell how much time had passed before they paused for breath. They could only account for the aftermath.

When Todd finally looked Neil in the eye, he wasn’t surprised to find them filled with stars. He assumed he always had been. He doubted he could ever have fallen in love with someone who didn’t walk around with the universe cradled between their ribs. He ran a hand through Neil’s hair, just to check he was a real person and not some sort of apparition his own desire had manifested. He was pleased to find him solid and tousled above him.

Neil, unlike Todd, could not believe his eyes. Or his hands. Or his lips. He hovered over Todd, feeling everything and sensing nothing all at once. He was floating in a vacuum, numb to all earthly sensation, yet he was boundless, eternal.

“Really?” Was the only thing Neil could think to ask.

A smile spread on Todd’s face, wider and lovelier than ever.

He nodded.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for making it to the end! I wrote this over the space of several weeks, and somewhere in the middle of writing I started reading a Jane Austen novel. Only when I went back in to edit did I notice the difference in style between the first couple of chapters and the last. I was heavily under the influence of Regency-era literature. I hope it wasn't too distracting (and I hope even MORE that it went somewhat unnoticed). 
> 
> ANYWAYS! This is only my second Anderperry fic, but the first one I wrote had so many encouraging and lovely comments that I decided to give this one a go. It's not very plot-heavy but whatever. I hoped you liked it regardless.
> 
> I might write an epilogue to this where I bring Keating into it and close it off all nice and tidy, but for the moment I'm tired of having this in my drafts. Do let me know if you'd like an epilogue, though.
> 
> Again, thank you so much for reading and I hope y'all have a nice day!!
> 
> (You can find me online @/naturenamu on twitter and @/rileyblxu on tumblr!)


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